Shadow of The Day
by Jaja2614
Summary: After a mysterious event in Japan, Sakura and her brother escape reality and move to a nearly fantasy town in Italy to start a new life. When Sakura's past begins to resurface, she must decide to pick up her cards again to save those she loves. SxS


AN: Ok, this is a new fanfiction I'm working on, and I'd really like some feedback. The begining is a little slow, but I think it gets a little bit better as it goes on. It's pretty much just an experiment, but I plan on working hard to finish it by the time summer's over. Let me know what you think and enjoy.

Disclaimer: I do not own Cardcaptor Sakura or any of it's characters, for if I did, I would probably abuse that power way too much.

Take it from me, the popular crowd is no place to be if you want to go far in life. When I was sixteen, my life fell apart in more than one way. After the deaths of two of the most important people in my life, I swore off the magic that had caused them and my brother and I moved away from our small Japanese town to a very different small town in Italy. When we moved, I took this as an initiative to change who I was. I would no longer be Sakura Kinomoto, the bubbly little girl who played around with cards and talked to her "stuffed animal". No, I would become Sakura Kinomoto, the girl everyone wants to be, gorgeous and fragile. For two years, I worked hard to be popular, and by senior year I had finally achieved what I thought was the impossible; I was on the top of the social ladder, "queen b".

I honestly thought that my life couldn't have gotten any better, that is until the night my past came back to haunt me.

--

Folding my arms across my chest, I took a deep breath, inhaling the sweet scent of the ocean and mixed odors from the party. I took a sip from my cup of God knows what and turned to face my date, Sebastian. He was a good five-ten and his blonde hair covered up his beautiful blue eyes in a rather appealing way, so he was needless to say a fine selection. His nice tan skin shone in the light from the sunset that was bearing down on the crashing waves, and he was going on about some surfing lesson he had attended on his summer holiday in Australia.

"If you're trying to impress me, " I said coolly as he paused his story to glance nervously at me, "there's really no need."

He grinned and took me by the hand. "Dance with me?"

I drained the rest of my heavily spiked juice and let him pull me to the edge of the water, swaying to the rhythm of the waves. "If you're expecting to sweep me off my feet with that Italian accent of yours, you can do better than dancing to no music," I said with a slight frown.

He considered this for a moment and leaned his face close to mine. His perfect lips were so close to mine, and the smell of alcohol on his breath was overwhelmingly strong and enchanting. "What can I do to sway you, _bella_?" He whispered, letting his blue eyes stare straight into my emerald ones.

I let a small smile flicker across my lips as I leaned in closer to him and said, "Kiss me?"

His lips brushed mine slowly and my head begin to feel fuzzy as I tasted the immense amount of alcohol on both our lips. I abruptly fell backwards, crashing into the deep blue water.

As a sheer chill began to creep over every inch of me, I faintly heard druken cries for help and a distinct whirring noise from above. I opened my eyes and looked confusedly around myself. Why did I drink all of that? Where's the surface? Thoughts spun around my head in a whirl of perplexion as I swan up. Or was it down? Suddenly a face swam in front of mine and I closed my eyes.

_Not now. Stay away. I don't need these visions… not now._ I kept thinking the same thing over and over as I mysteriously began to float towards a dark light. In my baffled state, I wondered about the whole "air" thing. It really wasn't that big of a deal, and I was doing fine without it. I opened my mouth to gasp for some as large warm arms encircled my waist and dragged me in a strange direction. Breaking the surface, I spluttered and glanced around.

"Thanks Seb," I heard myself mutter as my vision began to blur. Every sensation happening to me seemed as though it passed straight through. I was vaguely aware of people yelling, a cold chill, and scared brown eyes staring at me before my vision blacked.

--

Bright light filtered through my closed eyelids and I blinked rapidly as a door slammed near me. I sat up slowly and looked around, trying to ignore the immense sharp pains occupying my head. I was lying in a familiar room. Yes, this was my room, but how did I get here? Did I dream last night? No, my arm was covered in scrapes from the bottom of the ocean. So then… who saved me?

I stood up and stretched, swallowing down the urge to vomit and walked to the bathroom. My face was pale and my eyes tired and dull. A soft knock came from my bedroom and I gripped the counter tightly. God, how much did I drink?

"Yeah?" I called out, rubbing my head.

My brother entered my room and sat down on the small bed. He sighed, putting his head in his hands. "What is wrong with you?"

I flinched at his tone. It wasn't angry or reprimanding, but relieved and stressed. I could definitely hear the worry from last night in his voice. "I'm fine Touya. It was a mistake that I won't be making again."

"Damn right you won't," he said, watching me walk towards him. "When you showed up, passed out, with cuts all over your body, completely soaked and reeking of alcohol, I nearly punched that smug rich boy who brought you."

I grimaced as more memories from my night flooded in. "Was it really as bad as I remember it?" I groaned, recalling the bits of the conversation, if you could call it that, I overheard from my hungover state.

Touya stared at me blankly from the bed. "I thought that moving here after everything that happened would _help_ you, not turn you into some huge partier."

Frowning, I ignored his comments and said, "Did Seb drive me home?"

"No. That Cecelia girl did. Sebastian was to drunk to drive, but he carried you to the front door." His tone began to scoop back into the angry state he'd been in last night.

I sat down and rested my head on my big brother's shoulder, and mumbled, "I'm sorry Touya. So, did you thank Seb for pulling me out of the water at least?"

He turned his head and gave me a strange look. "He didn't pull you out of the water. All he told me was that some guy drove past on a scooter just as you fell in. When he called for help, the guy came down to help. By the time he had pulled you out, this guy was in a panic, trying to wake you up, but Sebastian brought you back here before he got his name."

My stomach reeled again as I saw a flash of brown eyes looking over me and a warm deep voice yelling at the empty faces around me. "My head hurts, I think I'm going to go back to sleep and then go buy some stuff I need before school starts up again tomorrow."

Touya looked once more at me before sighing and standing up. "Alright, but if you come home trashed again, I'm enrolling you in that all girls school up the hill."

His foot steps echoed down the hallway while I closed the curtains and drifted back to sleep, blocking the warm brown eyes from my mind.

--

The rain began to poor down fast and hard as soon as I left the house. I saw a girl around my age, possibly from my high school, running from a boy and screaming her head off. Panicking, I slipped into the shadows and tried to keep the memories from my head. They poured in none the less, like a waterfall that I couldn't stop. The screams of my father echoed in my head, the visions of a dark figure with a ball of bright light swam before my eyes and I gripped the walls of the alleyway, pushing them as far back as possible.

A hand grabbed at my shoulder and I gasped, spinning around to face whoever it was. I came face to face with a pair of all too familiar brown eyes. "Are you alright?"

I blinked repeatedly, a familiar name I thought I had left in the past. My mind whirled and felt myself mumble, "Syaoran?"

The boy's eyes widened and he stepped a little closer. "Sakura?"

I weakly nodded and stared into his warm eyes. They looked confused and a little sad, so I reached out to touch his face.

He moved a little away from me and said, "You look so different. Why are you in an alley during a storm? Don't you know what sort of people come by here?"

I glanced down at my fingernails, bloody from scraping at the brick and white from fear, and avoided his gaze. "It's been a rough time for me ever since I left."

He reached out for my hand and pulled me out of the alley. "Where do you live," he asked roughly. Suddenly unable to speak, I pointed to the house a few short meters away. He sighed and said, "I live right down the street, so I'll take you inside and help you get cleaned up."

He let go of my hand and stared at something down the street.

--

The clouds outside began to slowly fade away in the distance, and I focused on what was outside the window while Syaoran busied himself in the kitchen. I smelled the hot coffee he was making, but all I felt was a numb pain and a craving for something much stronger than the black drink he was brewing.

Syaoran was as silent as he had been for the past ten minutes, occasionally looking back at me to check that I was alright. Although he wasn't saying anything, his silence told me all that I needed to know, we had some underlying issue that he wasn't willing to let go. How could he blame me for leaving when he knew what I went through?

The cold ringing of a coffee mug hitting the table in front of me stirred me from my reverie. His cold voice reverberated around the room as he said, "What were you doing last night?"

I stiffened and muttered, "I was at a party, why?"

He took a long gulp from his mug and said, "Because I pulled you out of the ocean, drunk and scared. You know, I didn't even recognize you until today. I thought you were just another stupid senior who cared more about random hookups than her future." He glanced at my short summer dress and carefully done up hair and mumbled, "Maybe I was right."

I stared down into my mug and avoided his gaze. Why did I feel such a need to please him? I never need to please anyone, I'm Sakura Kinomoto, people please me. Yet at the back of my mind, I felt an overpowering urge to make him understand. It took over as I said, "I care about my future, but I can't have any fun now? Everyone makes mistakes, mine was standing all too near the water while I was drunk. Besides, I got pulled out, didn't I?"

I glance up at him and wished I hadn't once I saw his usually bright warm eyes harden over with anger. "Yeah, you got pulled out, " he snarled, "but what would have happened if I hadn't driven by just then? Would your drunken Italian boyfriend have pulled you out?" Behind his anger, I thought I heard something else, maybe jealousy.

"He's not my boyfriend," I shot back weakly. He just stared at me and took a long gulp from his coffee.

"I have to go," he said, scraping his chair across the kitchen floor and walking toward the door. He glanced back at me, and I tried to see within his eyes to understand what he was feeling, but I could no longer read him like a book. The door slammed behind him and I slumped back in my chair, swirling my coffee around my mug.

--

_That night I laid in my bed, staring at the dark ceiling and emptying my mind. I had escaped from those dreams and visions for so long, and last night had just been a slip. I closed my eyes and pushed the thoughts of cards and talking bears from mind, replacing them with cell phones and boys. Sebastian, Marco, Syaoran. No, he was part of past that just happened to be here. He had no right being in my thoughts, and I shook my head._

_A cold blue glow came from the corner of my room, shining in front of my closed eyelids, calling out to me in a soft voice. It called for me to open my eyes and face the cards that I had bound inside of their book and tried to forget. I opened my eyes carefully and came face to face with an icy blue pair. "Hello Sakura."_

My scream echoed through the empty house as I shot straight up in bed, my eyes furiously searching my apparently empty room. Touya sprinted wildly into my room, his face pale and scared. I tried to stop the tears, but he saw them and walked carefully to my bed. "It's ok," he whispered, taking me into his arms. "He's gone now, there's no need to worry…"

I curled up into his embrace and tried to run those cold eyes from my thoughts.

--

I woke in the morning wrapped in Touya's arms and shivering. The mist outside my window loomed above my house, shielding the town from my view. I stood up and walked to my bathroom, stepping into the hot shower. My mind automatically circled around the previous night and stuck to normal thoughts, like the fact that it was finally the first day of senior year.

I stepped out of the shower twenty minutes later and fixed my hair in a neat braid snaking down my back then slipping into a floral print dress. Today would be no different from any other day, and I would make absolutely certain of that. I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror and did a quick double take. My emerald eyes and light brown hair were the only things that now separated my appearance from _hers_. My hair was styled the way that _she_ used to style hers, my dress one that she would have been proud to wear, but my face held less poise, less grace, and less natural beauty. I stood completely still for a few moments, staring at yet another ghost from my past, until Touya lightly knocked on my bathroom door.

"Sakura," his deep voice called worriedly from the other side of the door. "Are you alright?"

I gulped down my fear and pulled my eyes from the mirror. "I'm fine, " I said shakily. "I'll be downstairs in a minute."

I heard him hesitate at the door before turning around and leaving my room. I slumped against the mirror and undid my hair. It would do me no good to think about _her_ anymore, if I wanted to let go again I had to let go of everything.

--

As I stepped onto the school property, I felt the usual rush of power enter my body, and a long forgotten smile stretch across my lips. Familiar faces waved and called out to me, and I let all of my inhibitions fade away, leaving a sense of belonging that I had dearly missed over summer holiday. Sebastian stepped out of the shadows and stopped in front of me, his legendary smirk gracing his beautiful features.

"Sakura, how are you doing?"

I raised an eyebrow and calmly said, "I'm fine Sebastian, but if you don't mind, I need to be getting to my first class."

He grinned and said, "Nice to see that you're back to normal."

"Did you really think a simple fall could break me? I'm not that fragile," I said, stepping around him and smiling back flirtatiously. He blinked and I walked away. Before I reached the office, I stopped to talk to a few of my friends from last year and they were pleasant enough with me, filling me in on their various vacations in exotic places all over the world. The woman sitting at the small desk in the room at the end of the hall smiled politely at me.

"Good morning Sakura, how was your vacation?"

"Very nice, and yours?"

"Fantastic," she said, holding up a slip of paper. "Here's your locker assignment." I took the small sheet and watched as she began to root through a large file filled with class schedules. "Sorry, I'm a bit disorganized this morning, but I'll find your schedule in a second."

I smiled and said, "Oh that's fine, I'll wait over here."

Backing up toward the door I heard someone say, "Oh, well sure, I'll think about it." Spinning around, I saw that I was about to run into someone who was backing into the room. I moved out of the way and watched as he turned around. The boy had a pale but good looking face and his violet eyes were bright and happy. "Hi," he said shyly, glancing around the room. I tried to place his accent, as he was obviously not Italian, but I couldn't figure it out. "Is this where I'm supposed to go to get my schedule?"

"You're new then, right?" I asked, looking him up and down once again, taking in his dark hair and fair features. His aura seemed familiar and at the same time something all together new.

"Right," he said, holding out his hand, "My name is Edward, I'm a transfer student from England."

I placed my hand in his as he took it and lightly placed a kiss upon it. "I'm Sakura, I transferred here from Japan a few years ago. I promise this place isn't as scary as it seems."

He beamed at me and I felt my stomach flip around. His smile was so enchanting, I almost didn't notice the presence of someone else in the room. Edward, however, spun around to greet the newcomer. My stomach began to flip a little more as I saw Syaoran standing in the corner. His brown hair was slightly messy, and he was staring coldly at Edward. Ripping his eyes from the boy, he walked to the desk and stood tall over the woman sitting there.

"I'm Syaoran Li, transfer from Japan. My file should be near the top," he said, flicking his finger in the general direction of the transfer student files. The woman glanced at the pile and grabbed a random schedule.

"Here you are Mr. Li."

He smiled politely and spun around, walking swiftly toward the door. Before I could turn back to Edward, the woman brandished a paper in the air. "Sakura, here's your schedule."

I smiled and took it from her. "Thanks."

--

Hurrying down the hallway, I caught up with Syaoran at his locker. "What are you doing here," I snarled. "I came here to start over and forget about the past. So far I've done a pretty good job, but you can't just waltz in here and bring back the past."

He didn't say anything, but rummaged around inside the locker, placing random books on a shelf. As he shut the door, he stared down at me with a bored expression on his face. "Don't think that my coming here has anything to do with wanting to be with you. The elders from my family sensed an evil coming from this town, and they sent me here to harness and destroy it. As far as you're concerned, have I said a single thing to you since I've been here?"

I stared slack jawed at him and tried to speak before he cut me off. "You've changed more than even you can see, and I honestly want nothing to do with you. Stay out of my way, and we won't have a problem." He turned on his heel and walked away from me.

Rooted to the spot, I stared at his back disappearing down the hallway. This was what I wanted, so why did it feel so bad?

--

I stepped through the doors of the school and hurried towards Touya's waiting car. He was watching the students mill around with a passive expression on his face, and he glanced at me to check my state of mind once I slipped into the passenger seat.

"How was the first day?" His voice shook with a tentative fragility, as though I might break if he said one wrong word.

I closed my eyes and tilted my head back, fumbling with an answer. "The beginning of the day was a bit crazy, you know, greeting old friends, things of that sort, but it was pretty good otherwise. How was work?"

He started the engine and began to drive away, amicably talking to me about his job at a nearby ice cream parlor. I listened easily enough until a sharp voice cut through my mind, whispering "Open your eyes". Fluttering my eyes open, I glanced out the window at a house very similar to my own.

The house was small and blue, it's shutters closed, but a car parked on the curb, it's deep green paint shining in the summer sun. The voice cut through again and said very clearly, "Remember."

My head swam with confusion and I muttered aloud, "Remember what?"

Touya turned his head to face me and looked at me carefully. "What are you talking about?"

My face turned bright red and I shook my head, making up what we both knew was a stupid excuse and turning my head back to glance at the house.

--

The house was silent except for an occasional cough coming from Touya's room and I sat in my bed, tapping a pen against my notebook and sighing in frustration. A slight pulse was resounding repeatedly inside of my head making it almost impossible to concentrate on practically anything else, and I slid open my phone. I had three new text messages, two from Sebastian and one from a girl my class named Lena. Ignoring Seb's messages, I quickly typed a short response to Lena, explaining our homework.

A few moments later I heard a creak coming from the stairwell. An uneasy feeling in the pit of my stomach, I half-whispered, "Touya?" The creaking came close until I saw a shadow pass outside of my bedroom and a knock sounded at my door.

"Sakura," came my brother's voice. "I brought you some tea, open up?"

I let out the breath I hadn't realized I had been withholding and opened my door to reveal my brother standing in front of me, holding a cup of tea. He smiled and walked into the room, taking in the walls and bed, his smile broadening. I took the cup from him and gulped it down as I felt an unimaginably large thirst as soon as I saw the cup. My head began to spin and I sat down, mumbling for Touya to come nearer. He stepped closer and said, "Are you alright?", but his voice sounded far away and my vision began to swim.

"What's going on?" I tried to say, but heard my voice come out in an unintelligible mess. A blue light began to flicker at the edges of my brain and I felt a large amount of power begin to drain from me. The last thing I saw was a darkness befall the room before I lost complete conciousnnes.

--

TBC


End file.
